Drayton Manor visit - advice needed please...

OK so we are going to Drayton Manor on August Bank Holiday in a family party for someones birthday( ... not my first choice of date I have to say!) & we've actually never been there.

Has anyone got any top tips on surviving the crush, obviously we are planning to get there early, but anything else?

Someone told me that you can pre-book your tickets and then you don't have to queue or something? was thinking of using Tesco vouchers, but would I have to wait ages to get the tickets & get in if I do that?

All Comments

I've been to Drayton Manor (last summer) and I must admit the queues were long to get in, and I believe we had prebooked tickets, that we had to pick up there.

The Tesco Club card vouchers shouldn't take that long to come in once you have ordered them - they usually get to your home within the week.

I haven't got Drayton Manor vouchers before, but I have got paradise wildlife park vouchers, and they came in the form of £10 money off vouchers - I had applied for £50 worth so I got 5 £10 money off vouchers, which I produced at the payment kiosk on requesting the family ticket. I believe I had to top up the deficit - with £4 cash.

We arrived at Drayton Manor over half an hour before it opened, and there was already quite a queue, I don't think you can avoid that - but I think going any later, and it would have just got worse and worse for the next few hours. Inside it was nicely spaced out, and I don;t remember moaning about the queues - I guess we were too busy having a lovely time.

I don't know if they do any fast passes or queue jumping system like legoland where you pay extra money on top, and can get a pass which allows you to 'virtually' queue whilst you go doing something else, and then come back to your space in the queue but near the front! I hope you get what i mean - lol.

There does tend to be queues at the entrance, but they go down fairly quickly so just be patient.

Not sure what the age make up is of your party but Drayton Manor market themselves as a "family park" unlike Alton Towers which goes all out for white knuckle rides.

So while there are some good white knuckle rides, there are also family rides, kids rides, and a zoo and farm. There is also Thomas Land, a themed area with rides based around the Thomas characters.

However, you have chosen to go on an August Bank Holiday, which I have to say would be a BIG no no for me (for any theme park).

Thomas land will be packed and as the rides are small the queus will be huge.

The queues for the big rides like Shockwave, Stormforce, Apocalypse etc will all be huge and probably over an hour.

I would go there, enjoy the day, stroll round the zoo, but dont expect to get on many rides.

The queue of cars to get out is bad as everybody funnels out the same way, so either go before the end, or wait till the VERY end and maybe have a picnic while the queues die down.

Oh, and dont bother to queue up for Excalibur, a Dragon’s Tale which is the WORST ride I have ever been on in any theme park. Boring boat ride round a land full of Knights that do almost nothing. Boring for kids, very boring for adults.
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They have built another ticket office now so queues should not be so big.

Good advice above, I would say the most important thing to do is get there an hour before the park opens, make sure you are in the park for when the rides open.

Stop till the very end as after about 4-5pm the park will quieten down a little, also if the closing time is say 6pm sometimes if it a nice day they regularly keep the park open another hour by which time it will be even quieter.

As said above the queues will be long but since they opened Thomas Land the park is much busier and is more or less busy everyday.